Summer is upon us and for fleet owners you know, all too well, that means more cars on the road, and more traffic for your fleet. There are some things you can do, though, that will help you get the best possible mileage for your fleet all summer long, including the following 15 things. Read the rest of this entry »

Researchers in the College of Public Health from the University of Iowa conducted a new study that found young drivers are motivated to be safer when their parents talk with them about safe driving and combine it with the use of video monitoring technology.

The study found in-vehicle video systems paired with parent communication more effectively improved high school driver safety. According to the study, when parents received training on ways to communicate better with their teens about safe driving, it reduced the possibility of unsafe driving incidents in the future by almost 80 percent.

Around 3,000 teens between 15 and 18 years old in the United States die each year in vehicle accidents, according to the College of Public Health’s professor of occupational and environmental health and study co-author, Corrine Peek-Asa. This makes vehicle crashes the leading cause of teen death in that age group.

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Fleets everywhere are looking for ways to attract, keep, and reward stellar drivers. You understand, all too well, the challenges of keeping good drivers in an industry devastated by driver shortages. One way to do this is to create amazing rewards programs for your drivers. Before you dive in and get started, though, keep these four tips in mind for greater overall success.

1. Create Very Specific, Measurable Rules and Points Systems

Clarity is important for endeavors such as this. That is especially the case when it comes to offering financial rewards or compensation for specific milestones and achievements. Be specific when establishing rules, determining how points are awarded, and designating the rewards for accomplishments. It can be a set number of “safe” driving miles (in which you designate what safe means to your organization), reducing idling time by a certain percentage, or even something as simple as number of miles driven without speeding.

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July is the month well-known for celebrating Independence Day. It’s also one of the hottest months of the year, leading to many summer vacations and other festivities. However, not only is July a hot month in terms of temperature, but it’s also a hot month when it comes to vehicle theft in the U.S.

According to estimates by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), in 2017, the value of vehicles stolen was almost $6 million. Because summertime is a prime time for vehicle thieves, the NHTSA is designating July as the National Vehicle Theft Protection Month.

As part of their vehicle theft prevention outreach, the NHTSA works hard to educate vehicle owners about ways they can deter the theft of their vehicles and what precautionary measures they can take. The NHTSA provides infographics, fact sheets and other relevant information, helping to inform consumers about high-theft areas by state, the prominence of vehicle theft and who to contact and what to do if a vehicle theft occurs.

To keep your vehicle out of the hands of thieves, the NHTSA urges you take certain measures.

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Some people have a limited understanding of how GPS works. For the average user, it is enough that you turn on your GPS tracking device and it tells you roughly where you are and helps you find directions to get where you want to go. You don’t even fully comprehend, in a world of fancy interfaces, that what you’re seeing on the screen is literally a series of numbers, representing precise coordinates, behind the fancy user interface. Specifically, you’re seeing where two numbers intersect.

Longitude and Latitude

Your location, at any point on the earth, can be represented by pinpointing your latitude and longitude. The longitude refers to vertical lines that dissect the earth from the North to South Poles. Beginning with the Prime Meridian, which is represented as 0 degrees and moving east beginning and one degree and ending at 180 degrees and indicated with the letter E.

Those moving west of the Prime Meridian also begin with one degree and move on until reaching 180 degrees. These are indicated with the letter W.

The latitude, on the other hand, indicates the north/south location. These numbers begin with zero degrees at the Earth’s equator and increase by one degree moving north or south up to 90 degrees in either direction. Each one indicated by an N or S.

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